Games@lemmy.worldbyRyoae@piefed.social
2 days

The Helldivers 2 Community needs to get a fucking grip on itself

English

Unbelievable from what I’ve read about just now. This is games-related because it is targeting a gaming community, one that has seemingly taken things too far than they needed to go.

Summary: A user, who I will not name, issued a challenge to the developers of Helldivers 2 to play their game on the hardest difficulty on a mission mode that is known for being difficult, poorly designed and glitchy. Should the developers complete it, he will donate $1,000 to charity of his choosing.

The fanbase? They didn’t take this kindly and have now been making it a campaign to make that user’s life a living hell. Even up to making said user lose their IRL jobs. I’m surprised the user hasn’t killed themselves yet and I hope it never gets to that point.

If you’ve been on the Helldivers 2 subreddit and Steam community, you will know what is going on. I am talking of this because, I hope to never ever see this kind of behavior happen within the Fediverse, because we are supposed to be better than this. I’m not surprised that the rapid dogpiling in rabid irrationality, happened from Reddit because that’s where a lot of it comes from.

There is way more to this drama than I am speaking of, but all it has been doing, is making me disgusted over game-based communities who allow this to happen. I’m disgusted at the people who could’ve nipped it in the bud before it got out of control but didn’t. I’m disgusted at Reddit for predictably allowing it to happen.

I have not felt this disgusted towards something since the Night in the Woods incident. Absolutely disgraceful.

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    • Obinice@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4 hours

      The fanbase? They didn’t take this kindly and have now been making it a campaign to make that user’s life a living hell.

      I only browse the community stuff rather than engaging with it, but we’ve had very different experiences.

      What I’ve seen is everybody discussing how messed up you’d have to be to do something like that, after a minority of players did all that horrible stuff, the fanbase overwhelmingly calling for those responsible to face punishment in court and to be permanently banned from the game and community.

      As can be expected of any community, there’s always unhinged, bad people in the mix. There are bad people on Lemmy, there are bad people everywhere. That’s just life. As a society, we deal with them when they show themselves, and we take care of each other.

      You can tar the whole community with one brush if you’d like, but that’s not a path towards anything positive. It only leads to people like me being offended and angry when you claim I’ve (as part of the fanbase) been on a campaign to make someone’s life hell.

      It’s just not productive.

    • I Cast Fist@programming.devEnglish
      5 hours

      the Night in the Woods incident

      I’m so out of the loop (it’s great for my own mental health) that I never heard of that one, and I quite enjoyed playing NitW

      • Ryoae@piefed.socialEnglish
        4 hours

        Okay so this is entirely going off the top of my head as I remembered it.

        So in 2017, the MeToo movement was strong (actually I just learned it started as early as 2006 on MySpace, just gained lots of momentum by 2017). And, it was strong and going where lots of allegations were fired off from women who were sexually assaulted or objectified or other similar things afflicted to them.

        And allegations were made towards Alec Holowka, who was the Developer/Programmer/Musician of Night in the Woods. He was alleged to have physically and emotionally abused Zoe Quinn in 2012. These allegations didn’t come to light until August of 2019. Within a day after the allegation, the team behind Night in the Woods immediately severed ties with Alec, they claimed they had evidence and all that.

        Four days after the allegation and the severation, Alec committed suicide. Now this sparked a huge drama-storm of its own and has heavily divided the Night in the Woods community. Because, the allegations were left unresolved which made a lot of people think that Zoe Quinn just wanted to ruin Alec’s life. Keep in mind, MeToo was a wildfire of its own because as we’ve learned later on after that wave, people were found to have made lots of unproven allegations just to ruin another’s reputation.

        Not to say all of them were unproven, it is just a large amount of alleged claims were. It was just exhausting to hear yet another allegation come up after so many years after the fact that it happened and then it becomes a giant he-said she-said dramasode that goes on and on and on. You can see the problem. Also, the whole GamerGate thing was happening too.

        All I know from the whole thing was that people really, really hated Zoe Quinn. It was a huge messy situation that went off the rails, divided a community, alienated people about MeToo, made people hate Zoe .etc

        Just, ugh. I hated everything about that incident. It’s just another incident where people didn’t sit the fuck down, analyze things closely, figure out who is telling the truth and coming to conclusions based on those findings. People rushed to conclusions right off the bat, immediately sided with Zoe just because she was a woman and demonized Alec just because he was a man.

    • bitjunkie@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5 hours

      Fun game but didn’t get too into it because you could feel the sweat immediately

    • kittykillinit@lemy.lolEnglish
      5 hours

      Bandwagoning morons hate it when smart people criticize their entertainment.

      • Ryoae@piefed.socialEnglish
        4 hours

        Hey Bud, how about you go out there and try changing the world on your own. Come back and let us know how it goes.

    • PerogiBoi@lemmy.caEnglish
      1 day

      It’s why I stopped playing all multiplayer games tbh. People are fucking feral.

      • KatakiY@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3 hours

        I’ve not actually run into more than two or three assholes in helldivers. Almost everyone is cool. Idk if it’s because I exclusively play in7-10 difficulty on PC or what.

        Lots of funny people, and almost everyone pulls their own weight and when shit goes wrong usually everyone has a laugh.

        Also being the host helps cause I just kick the couple of people who are assholes lol

      • Final Remix@lemmy.worldEnglish
        19 hours

        Warframe recently changed pugs to automatically and instantly disband upon mission completion. It’s kind of awesome. I actually don’t only play solo now.

      • TronBronson@lemmy.worldEnglish
        22 hours

        Yea but like its the best way to avoid the feral people in the real world so kinda sucks.

    • Spacehooks@reddthat.comEnglish
      1 day

      Well thats really pathetic. All user did was challenge rhe devs to play the game they made. Absolutely insane to try to ruin someone’s life over it. Can’t they use that energy towards something good?

      • kittykillinit@lemy.lolEnglish
        5 hours

        Can’t they use that energy towards something good?

        No, that’s why they’re dependent on crap like helldivers.

        It’s life-support for losers.

    • Goretantath@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      Remember, half the community doesn’t realise the plot is parody of them and not actually glorifying their ideals.

      • Katana314@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2 days

        We seriously need to give up on the sarcastic, parodic pro-capitalist games, and go back to ripping heads off of virtual fascists.

        • Enkrod@feddit.orgEnglish
          2 days

          That’s honestly why I’m torn on Warhammer 40k movies and series, some idiots really do not get it that EVERYONE is horrible in that universe and that the racist, fascist, xenocidal, fanatic, militarist theocracy that has the skull as their main item of decor is evil and a parody on thatcherite conservatism cranked up to 12 (because 11 wasn’t enough).

          It is so hard to depict the factions of the empire in a light where you can somewhat identify with the individuals, stuck in the machine to be able to tell a story while at the same time making it look cool AND showing that “this is bad, this is really bad and stupid”. And keeping simpleminded fools from being taken in by that aura of power, toxic masculinity and fascism that oozes through every faction like a purulent infection designed by papa Nurgle himself.

          • Bababasti@feddit.orgEnglish
            23 hours

            That is a great summary of the Warhammer 40k universe and I say that as a fan of it.

          • DeadDigger@lemmy.zipEnglish
            23 hours

            Whaaaaaat but not my tech communism fascists! Surely they are ok!

        • ChicoSuave@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2 days

          Teach why Fascism is bad and doomed to failure instead of telling people they can’t tell one kind of joke.

    • piskertariot@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      Game is fun.

      Game supports upto 4 people.

      Game does not require a community.

      The reddit community around the game has been toxic as long as the game has existed. They bitch and moan and complain about every little aspect of the game, that barely impacts the game. I’ve enjoyed the game a lot more since I left the community.

      • maturelemontree@lemmy.zipEnglish
        5 hours

        Right, like it is an extremely low stakes game that you are supposed to lose sometimes. It costs you nothing to lose, and people are still upset when the developers “Nerf a top tier gun into the ground” by making it sway .5 percent more and that makes the game unplayable.

      • Goodeye8@piefed.socialEnglish
        2 days

        Ironically I gave up on the community for the complete opposite reason, you can’t criticize the game because criticism is always met with “you’re an enemy of super earth”. I get it, Super earth is a fascist civilization and Helldivers are the extension of that fascism and a lot of it is on the nose and it’s okay to joke about dissenters, sometimes. But you don’t need to scream “enemies of democracy” every single time someone criticizes the game. The game is fun but it’s not perfect. There are real problems with the game, one of which has lead to this complete embarrassment of the community.

        In short, the Helldivers 2 community is toxic in every aspect and anyone interested in Helldivers is better off ignoring the subreddit, the steam community and probably also the official discord. Instead join [email protected] where this drama isn’t even mentioned.

        • 4am@lemmy.zipEnglish
          2 days

          The same people who would be susceptible to fascist thought are the same people who think Starship Troopers is about the good guys

          Now you understand why media like HellDivers always ends up with the fan base that it does.

      • criss_cross@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2 days

        Reddit communities around games in general are awful. I swear no one in those subreddits actually enjoys the game they supposedly dump thousands of hours into.

        • BigJohnnyHines@lemmy.caEnglish
          5 hours

          It’s not even just gamers or even Reddit users though. The online world has just normalized hyper-toxicity at all times. We all treat every comment like an argument. We’ve been taught hate as a default. Even the bots trained on us talk like that.

        • athatet@lemmy.zipEnglish
          1 day

          When I was on Reddit I remember there having to be specifically “no salt” versions of game subreddits because the main sub for the game got taken over by people shitting on it.

        • vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          1 day

          Hey now that’s not entirely true. The crusader kings community at least used to enjoy it, IDK been off reddit for several years so I don’t know if they’ve changed. Regardless the inbred ugly eugenics programs were always amusing.

      • Alfredolin@sopuli.xyzEnglish
        23 hours

        Game is fun. It’s a damn co-op. It rarely goes sideways in game. This is pure community drama, I’ve never participated in reddit and steam forums and glad I haven’t.

    • tomi000@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      Unfortunately many gaming communities are very toxic and it is easy to get sucked into that vibe so its a downward spiral.

    • danc4498@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      Is there a good summary thread? I wonder how exactly this user lost their job as a result of this.

      Edit: found this.

      https://www.reddit.com/r/HelldiversUnfiltered/comments/1rlj9qg/in_an_effort_to_cut_down_on_the_what_happened/

      This part was particularly interesting…

      Shortly after that the original Challenger post a video with his face and his voice clarifying all the rules talking about his love for the community, and the game, how he plans on donating the money regardless if they complete the mission or even attempt it…The only stipulation is they get to choose to charity if they win.

      • TheSeveralJourneysOfReemus@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2 days

        I can give some; A player started a charity event (proposed to) involving the dev team playing the game at its highest possible difficulty, difficulty 10, in a game where the highest achievement is obtained at difficulty 7, after which there are no achivements, so to play dif 10 you gotta love the game and be insanely good at it. Said challenge happens on the hardest scenario of the game, a difficult planet with a weird name that i forgot.

        Cool, I guess.

        Another player added to the challenge that he would pay the dev 1000 dollars, but not for charity, no no, but to prove that dif10 is fucking impossible. Which triggered a ’ discussion ’ that brought some ‘git gud’ players to be overzealous. They doxxed the first guy, sent death threats and other things too.

        in short, he got his life ruined because he attempted a fun charity event.

        I don’t engage with these communities…but it ended up in an article so i happen to know about it.

        • LaserTurboShark69@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          2 days

          To add a bit more clarity:

          Difficulty 10 isn’t that hard. I regularly play on 10 and I’m not great at the game.

          The truly challenging part of the challenge was that the devs were supposed to use specifically chosen niche, underutilized, and poorly balanced weapons and gear to prove the point that the devs are out of touch in regards to the gameplay and balance of the vast majority of the equipment available to players.

          A big aspect of this whole situation is that it arose because a huge chunk of the playerbase is fed up with the developer’s decisions.

          • [deleted]@piefed.worldEnglish
            2 days

            I thought the challenge was because it was a hive world which is a difficulty multiplier due to the alien’s home turf advantage including underground areas, special abilities like burrowing, and hive lords (sand worms). I missed the weapon choice restrictions.

            • starman2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              4 hours

              A second user issued the weapon restriction challenge. I don’t play HD2, but apparently they specifically chose weapons that the playerbase widely agrees are underpowered, but the devs say are fine

          • TheSeveralJourneysOfReemus@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2 days

            which is true (and i played difficult games in the past) but does it deserve the kind of response they had? My feelings about online gaming is that it was either the most fun (not relevant to the difficulty) or weirdly miserable. In the end, I think it’s the overly online crowd that does this, usually active players can be far more chill—

        • Almacca@aussie.zoneEnglish
          2 days

          Surely the only reply to the ‘get gud’ mob is to tell them to post a video of them doing it or gtfo. If they can’t do it, they pay $1000 to charity.

          • yermaw@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            1 day

            Nice idea, decent rebuttal, unfortunately superdoxxed and SWAT have been deployed to your house. That’ll learn ya for trying to have fun on the internet.

      • Tolstoy@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2 days

        AFAIK the person was doxxed and the employer was getting threats so it boiled down to security risk. But I just skimmed over some posts in reddit+steam so this might be total nonsense…

      • Redacted@lemmy.zipEnglish
        2 days

        Theres a pretty good one by youtuber dolan darkest, cant link it now but its only 2 minutesish long

    • RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      Okay, I know a lot about this issue, and it was one guy that doxxed him and a handful of users berating him. Its not “the community.” Its not acceptable. But neither is Arrowheads response, TBH. They should get Sony to get private investigators to catch the doxxer and make an example out of him, otherwise the doxxer wins. He gets what he wanted. This incident reflects on Arrowhead whether they want it or not, so they need to respond to it swiftly, not their “doxxing bad” public announcement.

        • starman2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          5 hours

          If they’re investigating someone who doxxed a user for saying a game that’s too hard and buggy is too hard and buggy, then maybe they should hire Boeing’s PIs

    • BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2 days

      When you fail to moderate toxicity, it gets worse. Both Reddit and the Steam forums are among the most vile, toxic, hateful social cesspits on the internet. Spez is a greedy piece of shit, but Valve should be ashamed of what they enable and tolerate.

      • Ryoae@piefed.socialEnglish
        6 hours

        You can’t tell me that Valve cannot hire a dedicated team of forum mediators to help mitigate the toxicity happening in their forums. They’re a multi-billion dollar company that could’ve made it happen ten times over by now, but choose not to and prefer people to be subjected to a snail team that takes their time getting to you. While letting the worst of autonomy take action.

      • Shrouded0603@feddit.orgEnglish
        23 hours

        Steam is toxic yea but to compare with reddit? Thats wild. At least in steam discussions everybody just hates you while Reddit has some true degens

        • starman2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          5 hours

          Yeah I don’t remember the last time Steam users bullied someone into suicide. I can think of at least three people who’ve been killed by Reddit.

    • Ulrich@feddit.orgEnglish
      2 days

      I hope to never ever see this kind of behavior happen within the Fediverse, because we are supposed to be better than this.

      That’s pretty naive, honestly.

      • SharkAttak@kbin.melroy.org
        2 days

        Hey, one can dream… I also fear the ‘reddit is leaking’ phenomenon, as the number of Fediverse users rise, the % of assholes will too.

    • lath@piefed.socialEnglish
      2 days

      The loudest are often the weakest. I’m averagely sure there was a (biased) study made back when it was popular which suggested many of the most intense participants of an online community barely participate in the activity itself and are instead more interested in projecting themselves as leaders or a person of influence in order to dictate or direct actions and narratives.